The mandala is a Tibetan Buddhist ritual artform that helps viewers envision enlightenment. Over the course of several days in October 2025, the Venerable Lama Losang Samten created the intricate and colorful patterns of a Kalachakra or “Wheel of Time” mandala at the University of Arizona. After its completion, he conducted a dissolution ritual during which the mandala was destroyed as a meditation upon impermanence. The Kalachakra is regarded as an especially powerful tool for healing and transformation and transmitted to Buddhist practitioners across the world.
This beautiful event, demonstrating the power of art to connect and heal, was sponsored by the Arizona Friends of Tibet in partnership with the University of Arizona Center for Buddhist Studies, Health Humanities Hub, Department of Religious Studies & Classics, Department of East Asian Studies, and Andrew Weil Center for Integrative Medicine.
Visit the Arizona Friends of Tibet website to learn more about Lama Losang Samten, the creation process--from building the altar to the dissolution ceremony--and the history and meaning of the Kalachakra mandala.